How Libraries Make us Believe

Abstract

This paper considers how the physical spaces of academic libraries actively assert the belief of intellectual pursuit upon users. Taking up Thomas Gieryn’s concept of “truth-spots,” this paper argues that the academic library is particularly effective at encapsulating and expressing this pursuit through its own spatial configurations. Library spaces achieve this through the manipulation of time, spatial gathering and separation, an imposed order, exposure and obfuscation, as well as the library’s unique or standardized configurations. This paper invites us to think about the library’s metaphysicality in terms that connect abstract beliefs to the library’s physical materials and spaces. The purpose of this paper is to identify the subtle, yet powerful, spatial changes occurring in recent efforts to reconfigure academic library spaces. The implications of such a consideration may aid to inform future (re)designs of library spaces.